Hi. I was wondering if anyone could point me to some other online sources that have sudoku that are about as hard as the Very Hard puzzles here, or maybe even a bit harder. It’s difficult to compare from site to site when different sites have not only different skill levels but different names for their skill levels. I mean, how hard is Evil, and is that more or less easy than Fiendish? Finding stuff at just the right difficulty level is proving to be, well, difficult.

Don't get me wrong, I love this site - it's a superb resource and there’s some great stuff in the archives, which I’ve been working through - it's just that from browsing this forum I gather that the dailysudoku.com puzzles labeled Very Hard have only recently been upgraded to the kind of high difficulty level I now find I like best (i.e. requiring x-wing and similar advanced techniques). Basically I'm asking for recommendations, either of particular very hard sudoku puzzles you think I might enjoy, or of other places where I might find such puzzles. My favorites so far from this site have been the May 29 and July 8 puzzles. June 27 was also really good.

I’m completely self-taught at this. I learned sudoku from the puzzles in the local newspaper, using just pencil and eraser. It’s been a real eye-opener discovering that all the techniques I painstakingly worked out for myself have in fact all long since been cataloged, thoroughly documented, and given fancy names - although I suppose I should have expected that, given the puzzle’s popularity. Anyway I really like this site, the detailed explanations given in some of the forum posts are absolute models of clarity for this type of thing, better and more comprehensive even than a recent Scientific American article I read on the subject. It’s just that I find myself still, well, craving more... You understand that, don’t you?

Thanx,
CT Yankee

BTW, is the the word “sudoku” also plural, or do you need to say “sudokus” when referring to more than one puzzle? I think just “sudoku” sounds much better, more Japanese - but then, the puzzle didn't really originate in Japan, did it?

I like the patterns and symmetries of the puzzles. It seems to me they are mostly very difficult puzzles that actually could be solved with only "basic" techniques like hidden sets, block-line interactions, etc. However, I find I often use XY-wings, Unique Rectangles, etc.

Not very hard, depending on who's assigning the rating. For example, on www.websudoku.com , the hardest ones are rated "Evil", but I stopped doing them because I didn't feel they were challenging enough.

Keith mentioned Brain Bashers; I've been doing some of their "Super Hard", which are interesting, but not super hard.

Keith also mentioned the Australian site, which is www.sudoku.com/au , whose "Tough" puzzles I have found to be the, well, toughest on a day-in, day-out basis.

I just tried the first and the last. Seem to be nice puzzles, that dont need chains (had xy-wing, xyz-wing, UR, BUG, turbot fish).
[Edit:]
As often, the difficulty is much varying. No 1 of book 50 is very hard compared to the other 2 ones, i needed 4 error nets.

Last edited by ravel on Mon Jul 24, 2006 1:36 pm; edited 1 time in total

Thanks for the replies and for all your recommendations. I will definitely be checking out some of those sites.

Quote:

Hi, Hank! Or are you some other Connecticut Yankee?

No, I'm not Hank. You mean there's somebody else already using the name CT Yankee specifically on Sudoku forums? Guess I'll have to come up with another name, then. I've been using CT Yankee for a while, but only on boards devoted to storm chasing (my other obsession, or one of them anyway). Ah well...

No, I'm not Hank. You mean there's somebody else already using the name CT Yankee specifically on Sudoku forums? ...

No, I didn't mean that at all. I was making an obscure literary joke. :)

As you might surmise from the signature appended to this message, I'm interested in the works of Mark Twain. In fact, I bought his complete literary works (on the installment plan) when I was only 14 years old -- one of the first big purchases I ever made.

Anyway, one of his most famous books is entitled A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. The chief protagonist in that story is named Hank Morgan. When I saw your nom-de-internet I immediately thought of the book; hence the little joke.